Five days until the election

With five days to go until the election, and already five nights of late night street rallying that’s kept much of the city up until 5 a.m., one wonders how much more of this Tehran can take.

There is a sense of excitement about the potential change that this election may bring about, but — perhaps from a mix of short-term fatigue and long-term exhaustion — there’s anxiety as well.

Most of my friends are finding it difficult to work and everyone is looking forward to getting out of the city after the vote on Friday. Part of it, I think, is the feeling of not having any control over the proceedings. That’s not to say that the election won’t be fair, I think it will be, but reliable polling statistics don’t exist, and Iranians are notorious for not saying what’s really on their mind, which leads to the queasy feeling of not knowing.

When Obama became president, it was not based on the idea that he was the “least terrible” option, and the narrative that he was not really of the system was, if not exactly true, plausible. Those things can’t be said of Mousavi.

He is as much a part of the fabric of the Islamic Republic as any of the rest. I hope that those comparisons can cease immediately, although that I doubt they will. While some Mousavi supporters shouted their slogans last night, a chador clad Ahmadinejad fan spat back, angrily repeating, “Obama,Obama!” As though Mousavi somehow represented the interests of the U.S. in Iran.

It’s one more very real disconnect between his supporters’ aspirations for his presidency and what his own personal political history

reflects: after all he was the Prime Minister under Ayatollah Khomeini.

To me it smells of the old Iranian train of thought that goes something like this: “We don’t know what we want, but anything would be better than this. Let’s put our eggs in this basket and hope for the best.” Of course of the confirmed candidates it’s safe to say that he is the best option, but to me the fanfare, especially given his incredible lack of charisma, seems unwarranted.

His supporters have seemingly spontaneously fallen in love with him. The old knock that he can’t really speak proper Farsi has been transformed into a cute quirk of his personality. His role in the Iran-Iraq War is now considered to be something that just comes with the territory. And all of a sudden he’s a feminist.

Ultimately, I hope there is enough gas in the collective tank to get us to Friday. At that time we’ll see what Iranians are really thinking, and if there’s actually any hope of change moving forward, or if it will be four more years of the same.